Scottish actor, David Tennant has had to play many different roles in his long career so far including Barty Crouch Jr. in Harry Potter, Doctor Who, and even Kilgrave in Marvel’s Jessica Jones.
However in this upcoming ITVX miniseries simply titled ‘Litvinenko‘, the 51-year-old is taking on a historical role as Alexander Litvinenko, the late Russian defector who died of poisoning.
The story of Alexander Litvinenko is a curious one. He was a former Russian Federal Security Services and KGB officer who died of polonium-210 poisoning in November 2006. Litvinenko claimed he had been poisoned on the direct orders of Russian president Vladimir Putin as punishment for his dissident. He was a prominent critic of Putin, advising U.K. intelligence on the Russians, and even coining the term “mafia state”.
In this first-look picture shared, Tennant recreates the famous photo of Litvinenko in his hospital bed, which made global headlines before his death.
Before his death, Litvinenko provided enough information to help track down the Russians that had poisoned him as he was convinced that it was a planned attack. His death sparked a legitimate investigation that led to a strained relationship between the United Kingdom and Russia.
The four-part series comes from Lupin showrunner George Kay, and delves into the interviews Litvinenko gave to two police officers in 2006, his claim that his poisoning was directly ordered by Putin, the hunt for the two men that had targeted hm with Polonium-210, and his widow Marina Litvinenko’s fight to be able to name the killers.
In the U.K, Litvinenko will stream exclusively on ITVX this December. The series will release on AMC+ in the U.S. and on Prime Video in Canada.
ITV added that former New Scotland Yard officers Clive Timmons and Brent Hyatt, along with Marina Litvinenko’s lawyer Ben Emmerson QC and the former spy’s family, helped produce the series.
